When Jim offers a Hawken kit, you can bet it will be authentic in form and function and appearance. It will be percussion. The barrel will be at least 34" and at least 1" across the flats. It will not be like the lightweight easy-carrying rifles that is about all we've known since 1970. It will be HEAVY, 10 -14 pounds, maybe more. Mountain Men used round balls and they had to be pushed very hard by lots of powder. They were survivors more than hunters. The whitetail we take now need very little killing compared to muledeer, elk, and big bears. A real Hawken is a MAN'S rifle, and they were carried all day long by strong and determined men who didn't whine at a 15lb. rifle. We might buy the kit and produce some gorgeous big bore guns, nice to have and display and admire, but come deer season we will likely head out with a Woodsrunner the same caliber as the Kibler Hawken, or a T/C with a sling, or even a fouler loaded with ball, but not Jim's Hawken. We haven't lived outside for months at a time nor during a Rocky Mountain winter, working, moving across ridges carrying lots of gear plus a real Hawken. We might play at it with our trucks and chain saws and Gortex underwear, not handmade moccasin but instead waterproof boots made for comfort with soles for firm gripping. We can imagine trekking through the 17th and 18th Centuries, but we don't get too many steps away from our cellphones, GPS devices, canned and freeze dried nourishment, and prescription medicines. We ain't Jim Bridger ever going to do or face the trials he dealt with daily. Neither he nor anyone alive then ever thought of themselves as engaging in sports or hobbies. About all we have in common with those rugged hunters, scouts, and trappers is a love for the high mountains and all they contain.
BTW, all that from a bored fellow stuck in a wheel chair for a few more weeks, a disgruntled old coot who will miss hunting season altogether due to a spine out of kilter and pinched nerves screaming for relief. "Better days ahead," I hear from doctors and friends; so forgive my ramblings and scrambled thoughts as I gaze upon the ducks and waiting birds just outside my window and wish I could be one of them. At least until the first of the year.